In a Middle East wracked by coups d'état and civil insurrections, the Republic of Turkey credibly offers itself as a model thanks to its impressive economic growth, democratic system, political control of the military, and secular order.

Recep Tayyip Erdoğan effectively bought the June 2011 elections by pumping credit into the Turkish economy.

But, in reality, Turkey may be, along with Iran, the most dangerous state of the region. Count the reasons:

Russia has sent two nuclear-powered submarines to patrol Eastern Mediterranean waters around Cyprus and enforce the island's right to explore for undersea oil and gas in its territorial seas, according to information from Defencenet.gr (Greece), citing a Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman.

Alexander Lukashevich said that Russia supports Cyprus and guarantees its security if it is threatened.

The Russian move is being interpreted as a clear warning to Turkey to stay away from Noble Energy's drilling sites.

First a parable: Once an inquisitive student sought out Rabbi Tom "Hillel" Friedman and asked Rabbi "Hillel," "Please teach me about the Middle East while I stand on one foot." The wise sage stroked his mustache, smiled thinly and said, "It's always Israel's fault. All the rest is commentary. Now go and study." Thomas Friedman's detachment from reason is in full display in his latest column, 2 for 2 or 2 for 1? First he makes some valid observations:

If clashes erupt between Israelis and Palestinians today, there is no President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt to absorb the flames. Now there is a Turkish prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, ready to fan them — toward Israel.

WikiLeaks’ boosters said that the group was waging a war on secrecy, and by the end of 2010 it seemed to be winning. The leaks marked “the end of secrecy in the old-fashioned, Cold War–era sense,” claimed Guardian journalists David Leigh and Luke Harding. A Norwegian politician nominated WikiLeaks for the Nobel Peace Prize, saying that it had helped “redraw the map of information freedom.” “Like him or not,” wrote a Time magazine journalist in December, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange had “the power to impose his judgment of what should or shouldn’t be secret.”

The logic seemed so simple--and so irrefutable.
Once people read the leaked information, they would become enraged and demand reform.

A Czech friend, who has achieved considerable success in life since then, reminded me that for several years he was a window-washer under the Communist regime. The government of the proletariat believed that the worst thing it could do to people who had dissented was to send them into the proletariat. During that period, he was very active in the democratic opposition.

Since he spoke good English, he was often asked by his comrades (probably not the right word) in the anti-Communist struggle for freedom to be the guide for visiting Western sympathizers. Often, he recounts, these were Western leftists eager to explain to those Czechs engaged in the battle for liberty that Marxian socialism was really a great idea, they just needed to make a few adjustments.

Imagine if you will, people who had grown up in an ideological dictatorship that sent people to prison for making the wrong joke being lectured by a bunch of spoiled, well-dressed Western intellectuals on the splendor of their prison.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

...in the summer of 2008 Al Jazeera threw a welcome-home party on live TV for Samir Kuntar after the Lebanese national was released from an Israeli prison where he had served twenty-nine years for bashing in the head of a four-year -old girl.The Strong Horse, by Lee Smith, p. 30

Allawi was convicted, according to his own confession, of conspiracy on behalf of the Hamas terror organization.

Samer Farik Muhammad Allawi, born in 1966, from Sebastia, who resides in Pakistan and serves as Al Jazeera's Afghanistan bureau chief, was arrested on 9 August 2011 at the Allenby Crossing, on suspicion of involvement in Hamas activities.

During his investigation by the Israel Security Agency, Allawi admitted that was recruited in 1993, while in Pakistan, to Hamas. Until 2004, he served there as a member of the "Supreme Palestine Committee", which supervises and directs Hamas institutions. He also collected donations for Hamas-affiliated organizations such as "Al-Aqsa Association" and the "Palestinian Information and Media Center."

Ibrahim writes in the context of a televised debate between a traditional Muslim and an Islamist--where Ibrahim defines Islamism as:

a hybrid abomination of sorts, whereby the better principles of Western civilization are absorbed and rearticulated within a distinctly Muslim paradigm. For instance, the Western stress on human freedom, human dignity, and universal justice, is, for Islamists, transformed into a stress on Muslim freedom, Muslim dignity, and Muslim justice—all, naturally, at the sake of the infidel.

The Palestinians have succeeded in making us believe a series of false assumptions, and on the basis of these false assumptions, they have submitted a series of false claims. Our problem with them is not where the borders will be, but rather with their refusal to recognize that this is the Jewish national home.

Public discourse in Israel about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict over the past several months, particularly in light of the meeting of the U.N. General Assembly and the Palestinians’ intention to ask for recognition as a state has been full of erroneous perceptions that need to be eradicated. This is necessary not only because these perceptions mislead many Israelis and cause confusion, but also because that same confusion radiates outward, leading many international leaders in the West to adopt them.

The source of these perceptions is the false Palestinian narrative. Precisely because this is happening, it is important to state that there is nothing more just than the Jewish people’s right to return to live in their ancestral homeland. This is moral, historical, legal, political, security-related, national and religious justice.

On the other hand, the false perceptions have been presented very well in Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' various speeches over the years, and recently with even greater force. This is the place to refute them.

1. According to the first perception, the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians is territorial in essence, and its solution is well known and could be accomplished in a short time if both sides would only show a great deal more flexibility.

This is most likely the last posting before Rosh Hashana begins tomorrow night. And so here I extend my wishes for a year of blessings and peace to everyone.

Dip your apple in the honey: Take the time to know life's sweetness.

~~~~~~~~~~

As for Klal Yisrael (the Community of Israel), my prayer is that we will stand together during these hard times, protected from Above.

~~~~~~~~~~

Last week, I spoke about the marvelous counter-conference -- "Perils of Global Intolerance at the UN" -- held in a hotel across the street from the UN while Durban III was going on. Sponsored by the Hudson Institute and Touro College, under the dedicated and vigorous guidance of Anne Bayefsky of Eye on the UN, the conference hosted a magnificent series of participants.

On March 6, 2008 an Arab terrorist went on a murderous rampage in Jerusalem's Merkaz HaRav Yeshivah. Eight young men were killed. Among them, my beloved sixteen-year-old son, Avraham David Moses, hy"d. This book explores the aftermath of terror and loss while grappling with the tensions between memory and memorial.Dr. Naftali Moses, describing his book Mourning Under Glass

This Fan Page DOES NOT belong to any Religion. We are not here to insult other Religion. The main aim of this PAGE is to spread the Truth about what is happening in Palestine to all the Human Beings.Freedom Will Come To Palestine, from their Facebook page

If the goal were actually to tell the truth, then this group has obviously failed miserably.

This particular fraud was already uncovered back in June, but it bears repeating:

And in this case, Arab countries that have never recognized Israel would implicitly be doing so when they voted to recognize a Palestinian state that envisioned itself beside Israel in a two-state solution to their conflict. That in itself would be a breakthrough, confirming Israel’s solid standing in the region.

In an emotional conclusion to a case that generated national debate over free speech rights, a jury on Friday found 10 Muslim students guilty of disrupting a speech by Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren at UC Irvine last year.

The Palestinians' initiative to seek U.N. recognition as a state, which goes to the Security Council on Monday, faces an uphill struggle to secure the nine votes needed for approval.

Without those votes in the 15-member body, the United States will be spared the embarrassment of having to veto the application, which would be a further blow to its floundering efforts to secure Middle East peace.

"And these critics continue to press Israel to make far-reaching concessions without first assuring Israel’s security. They praise those who unwittingly feed the insatiable crocodile of militant Islam as bold statesmen. They cast as enemies of peace those of us who insist that we must first erect a sturdy barrier to keep the crocodile out, or at the very least jam an iron bar between its gaping jaws." [emphasis added]

The Palestine Liberation Organization's ambassador to the United States said Tuesday that any future Palestinian state it seeks with help from the United Nations and the United States should be free of Jews.

"After the experience of the last 44 years of military occupation and all the conflict and friction, I think it would be in the best interest of the two people to be separated," Maen Areikat, the PLO ambassador, said during a meeting with reporters sponsored by The Christian Science Monitor. He was responding to a question about the rights of minorities in a Palestine of the future.PLO ambassador says Palestinian state should be free of Jews, USA Today, 9/18/11

After the expected outcry in response to Areikat's statement, the following was added to the article:

Clarification: In the headline and story, Palestinian Ambassador Maen Areikat says he was referring to Israelis, not Jews, when he stated that "it would be in the best interest of the two people to be separated first."

I'm unmoved by the hand-wringing over Israel's "isolation." When I came to the country 30 years ago, Israel had no relations with the USSR (and Eastern Europe), China, and India. There was no foreign investment and a UN General Assembly resolution still stood, condemning Zionism as racism. It will take more than a Cairo mob, a truculent Turk, and another UN resolution to make me feel "isolated."Middle East expert Martin Kramer, quoted by Todd Warnick

We all know the "big lie" technique: you say something enough times and everyone begins to believe it, whether anything close to approximating the truth or not.

Nowhere is that perhaps more successful these days than in Palestinian politics: "Gaza is the most densely populated place on earth"; "there are 4 (5? 6?) million Palestinian refugees"; "the number of Palestinians between the Mediterranean and the Jordan is equal to the number of Jews", and so forth and so on. Palestinians and the Arab countries make statements and an ignorant - or hostile world - accepts them at face value.

The latest canard Israel is now facing - internally and externally - is the country's supposed "diplomatic isolation." AP writes: "Israel isolated ahead of UN vote"; "Israel's alliances looking frayed," says the LA Times; "Israel isolated," says this Russia Today TV report; and of course, Israel's internal media headlines, whether television or many of its newspapers, constantly scream out as to Israel's "isolation" on the world stage.

1) An ad Thomas Friedman would support. Wouldn't he? Thomas Friedman is forever complaining about America's "addiction" to oil. It's a silly use of the term, though others (including President Bush) have adopted. A new ad promoting the recovery of oil from oil sands "vexes the Saudis."

“We have no interest in oppressing other people….It is not so much the country of Czechoslovakia; it is rather its leader, Edward Benes. He has led a reign of terror….The Czech maintenance of a tremendous military arsenal can only be regarded as a focus of danger. We have displayed a truly unexampled patience, but I am no longer willing to remain inactive while this madman ill-treats millions of human beings.” –Adolph Hitler, April 14th, 1939 (quote not fully authenticated, see note at end of my article)

Prague, Czech Republic

Visiting the Czech Republic prompts thoughts of the 1938 Munich agreement. Analogies with Nazism and the 1930s are overused today, made even more tasteless and cliché-ridden by the fact that many of those using them know very little about the situation then and now.

Beyond the simple narrative usually offered, a more detailed analysis shows a number of points that fit both situations better than people realize. That’s true despite the very important differences between the two cases.

On the occasion of your supporting Palestinian unilateral independence despite the dangers this presents for Israel while simultaneously criticizing Israel for not giving massive concessions in exchange for nothing. On the occasion of the world groveling before Mahmoud Abbas, a ruler of a mere one million people who is in partnership with an explicity genocidal terrorist group, is dependent on Western hand-out, refuses to negotiate or compromise, and has cancelled elections at a time when democracy is supposedly the big thing in the Middle East.

On the occasion of your ignoring the fact that Turkey is ruled by an Islamist party engaged in massive repression and the transformation of the country into a dictatorship, holding that regime up as a model for other Muslim-majority states as it arrests dissidents on a massive scale and keeps them under lock and key while threatening war with Israel. The U.S. government chooses this regime as its co-director in the most important new international counter-terrorist initiative and as its manager of the political transition in Syria.

1) They just don't make facts like they used to Arthur Brisbane deals with a supposed conflict of interest between the New York Times bureau chief Ethan Bronner and a PR firm. (More background here.)

Mr. Bronner was pointed in arguing that the attack by Mr. Blumenthal, who writes critically of Israel’s dealings with the Palestinians, was ideologically motivated and designed to discredit Mr. Bronner. Mr. Blumenthal’s piece may well have been influenced by an animus toward Mr. Bronner’s reportage for The Times. But the fact remains that the Lone Star engagement created a problem and stands as a reminder that The Times must be fastidiously independent, in reality and in appearance, or face attacks like this one.

In the end Brisbane's most damaging charge was that Bronner's actions constituted an "appearance of conflict of interest." I have sent a few e-mails to Brisbane about other issues.

1. One of my readers remarked that what we need to study now is the use of fifth columns to subvert and overthrow countries rather than the 1940-era conventional warfare blitzkrieg. Actually, and this was well-known at the time, the Germans used a very sophisticated strategy of ideological and institutional subversion. It is surprising how much this has been forgotten. Political parties and militias were set up or subsidized; newspapers bought up; German minorities organized. If any of you are interested in this I will provide examples in future, some of which I described (using U.S. intelligence archives) in my book, Istanbul Intrigues.

2. Turkey is now going to sell Egypt both unmanned aircraft and swift patrol boats. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, since both are U.S. clients and, according to the Obama Administration, allies. But this is something to watch in the future. Remember that the relatively moderate military commanders in both countries are on their way out and will be replaced by ideologically motivated (or opportunist) officers who will attack whatever they’re told. With excitable, reckless, and anti-American Recep Edrogan running Turkey and excitable, reckless, and anti-American Amr Moussa perhaps soon to be Egypt’s president, old American friends may soon be attacking other old American friends, or even U.S. forces.

Israel has fallen into the habit of defensively phrasing its rights--and requirements--in the context of security and defense in the face of the ongoing Palestinian terrorist attacks.

That may be seen by some as a way to avoid the hard issues in negotiating with the Arabs, but as history has clearly shown: the Palestinian Arabs have consistently avoided any real negotiations--the kind that require give as well as take, concession as well as demand--instead resorting to demands, threats, unilateral moves and terrorism.

1) Revising history I have a trivia question before our regularly scheduled commentary: To whom did Bill Clinton reportedly say, "I'm a colossal failure, and you made me one...?" After Prime Minister Yitzchak Rabin was assassinated in November 1995, he was succeeded by Shimon Peres. Peres quickly after assuming the reins of power started a series of withdrawals from Palestinian cities. Two weeks into his term, Peres withdrew Israeli troops from Jenin. An Associated Press story from November 20, 1995 reported:

Thousands of jubilant Palestinians whistled and clapped as Yasser Arafat arrived by helicopter Sunday to honor the first West Bank city given autonomy under the latest Israeli-PLO agreement. ... Janin is the first of seven West Bank cities that Israeli troops are scheduled to pull out of by spring. The pace of the withdrawal was accelerated after the Nov. 4 assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. "The path of peace continues, and it will not be slowed by those who raise their guns or by assassinations," Arafat said.

German official [from the Nazi-controlled DeutschBank]: “You dare not keep me out of here!”

Rick: “Your cash is good at the bar.”

German official: “What! Do you know who I am?”

Rick: ‘I do. You’re lucky the bar’s open to you.”

–“Casablanca,” (1942)

First it was Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and the Iranian revolution.

Hey, he said in effect, Yes, I’m a Persian, Yes, I’m a Shia, but I hate Israel and want to destroy it! And besides we’re all Muslims. So let me lead the Middle East. I know the way to kick the Americans out of the Middle East, too. By force! And the blood spilled and behold, Iran was popular for a while. But the Arabs and Sunni eventually found other heroes, and some became frightened of Iran’s power.

Delegations from the United States and several European nations walked out of the U.N. General Assembly Thursday during Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's speech, in which he repeatedly condemned the United States and said some countries use the Holocaust as an "excuse to pay ransom... to Zionists."

Delegates from France, Germany, and the United Kingdom were among those who walked out. Delegations from Canada and Israel were not present from the beginning.

Well, I still cannot tell you exactly what's going to happen tomorrow, after Netanyahu and Abbas address the UN. But the focus has sharpened considerably. And I can certainly look at what's happened so far.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Yesterday, President Obama did two things of significance with regard to this whole drama.

First, he met with Abbas, and told him that he indeed will veto the PA bid in the Security Council, if it comes to that.

I cannot tell you what Abbas said privately to Obama. But publicly the stance of the PA was defiant. They will go on, its representatives declared, and submit the request for full membership for a Palestinian state to the Security Council.

Yesterday, the UN was supposed to be the stage with Abbas as the star, playing out the drama towards the recognition of a Palestinian state.
But along the way, it looks like there may be another drama unfolding.

A last-ditch U.S. effort to head off a Palestinian bid for U.N. membership faltered. President Barack Obama tried to qualify his own call, just a year ago, for a Palestinian state. And French President Nicolas Sarkozy stepped forcefully into the void, with a proposal that pointedly repudiated Obama’s approach.

Of Recp Erdogan and Binyamin Netanyahu, which one has a) been carrying out mass arrests of the military and of journalists b) been allying himself with Islamists c) been rewriting the constitution to make it easier for his party to stay in power and d) had his military violate international borders to fight terrorists? Let's go the opinion pages of the New York Times for some clues. There's an op-ed by Carlos Strenger Netanyahu's friends, Democracy's enemies.

The logo of “the Permanent Observer Mission of Palestine to the United Nations” – on their website and on top of their official statements at the U.N. – shows the Palestinian Authority’s claim to a Palestine that stretches throughout the entire historical entity of the former Palestine mandate.

Absent from the logo is any hint that Palestine consists of anything other than Arab territory. No nod is given even to the U.N.’s 1948 decision to divide the region into Jewish and Arab sectors.

The situation in the West-Bank seems to be relatively quiet and, except for an occasional brawl between Arabs and Jews in a hotspot or two, nothing seems to indicate an upcoming dramatic event. Thousands of miles away in New York, however, a real storm is gathering as the world has gone wild again about the Palestinian – Israeli conflict.

The feverish diplomatic activities that are taking place around the Palestinian request for UN membership resemble international reactions to a war.

Sadly, these last ditch efforts to renew the peace process are doomed.
Why? Because those attempts completely ignore a strategic decision made by the PA almost three years ago.

After the election of Bibi Netanyahu as prime minister of Israel, the PA decided to implement the decision. It abandoned the peace process and instead decided to pursue international recognition of a unilateral declared Palestinian state.

This decision not only constituted a breach of the Oslo accords but also meant the end of the protracted peace process that had existed since 1993.

Consistency

Since then, all decisions and acts of the PA have been consistent with what has been agreed upon since the introduction of the revised strategy. One example was the refusal of the PA to negotiate during the unilateral building stop in the West-Bank which was announced by Israel in 2009.

The international community, however, ignored the PA decision and increased pressure on Israel instead.

A quick housekeeping update: After my last post, my gmail address went out again briefly, and then was again reinstated by GMail. Hope it won't happen again, but keep utilizing akushner@netvision.net.il when writing to me. As I expect to post frequently in the next few days, keep in mind that if you fail to receive my material it might pay to check my website:

The various projected doings at the UN are, perhaps, almost upon us. But here I want to provide some significant background regarding the issues surrounding a Palestinian Arab state.

Earlier this week, I attended a conference sponsored by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs and the World Jewish Congress on the subject of "The Rights of Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People in International Diplomacy."

Participants (in no particular order) included:

Ambassador Dore Gold, who heads the JCPA

Minister for Security Affairs Moshe Ya'alon

Dan Diker, Secretary-General of the World Jewish Congress

Professor Ruth Lapidoth, Professor Emeritus of International Law, Hebrew University

Ambassador Alan Baker, former legal adviser to the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs

Advocate Irit Kohn, President of the International Association of Jewish lawyers and Jurists

Professor Nicholas Rostow, Distinguished Research Professor, US National Defense University

There was overlap in the various presentations, certainly -- as well as consideration of topics I've touched on many times here. I will summarize by subject matter, noting sources as relevant, and limiting myself to the more significant facts and insights. There is considerable value to the material offered here.

Listen to real Jewish voters express their frustration with the Obama Administration.

We've heard the pundits, the pollsters, and the political scientists talk about the special election in NY's 9th congressional district. Now listen instead to real Jewish voters in New York talking about their frustrations with the direction of the Obama administration on Israel, the economy, and other issues.

This is especially important now, as the Obama Administration's pressure on Israel contributed to the Palestinian Authority's decision to abandon direct negotiations with Israel and instead push for statehood at the United Nations.

The voices of Jewish voters in NY-9 will multiply across the country and become an unmistakeable roar in November 2012, given the Administration's handling of Israel and the economy.

Palestinian refugees will not become citizens of a new Palestinian state, according to Palestine’s ambassador to Lebanon.

From behind a desk topped by a miniature model of Palestine’s hoped-for blue United Nations chair, Ambassador Abdullah Abdullah spoke to The Daily Star Wednesday about Palestine’s upcoming bid for U.N. statehood.

The ambassador unequivocally says that Palestinian refugees would not become citizens of the sought for U.N.-recognized Palestinian state, an issue that has been much discussed. “They are Palestinians, that’s their identity,” he says. “But … they are not automatically citizens.”

This would not only apply to refugees in countries such as Lebanon, Egypt, Syria and Jordan or the other 132 countries where Abdullah says Palestinians reside. Abdullah said that “even Palestinian refugees who are living in [refugee camps] inside the [Palestinian] state, they are still refugees. They will not be considered citizens.”

Washington – At a press conference today with Senate Foreign Relations Committee members Chris Coons (D-DE) andJohnny Isakson (R-GA), Senator Robert Menendez, Chairman of the Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere, said that if President Abbas moves forward with his plan to seek a UN resolution, “I will be obliged to re-examine all US funding provided to his government.”

“Let me be clear, the United States is not simply an ally of the Israeli people, it’s an ally of Israel’s democratic ideals,” said Menendez. “It’s an ally of its history, of its aspirations for peace and prosperity, its can-do spirit and amazing resilience in the face of threats from all sides.”

He added: “If President Abbas insists on acting irresponsibly this week in New York, he will make clear that he does not value America’s support and assistance to the Palestinian people and that Israel does not have a serious partner in the peace process.”

The Iranian minister of foreign affairs, Ali Akbar Salehi, is now scheduled to take part in the conference known as Durban III, according to a well-placed source close to the United Nations. On September 22, the U.N. will "commemorate" the 10th anniversary of Durban I that ended just three days before 9/11. Given that Iranian leaders hope for the genocidal destruction of the U.N. member state of Israel and deny the Holocaust, their enthusiasm for the Durban phenomena blows the lid of the event's "anti-racism" cover.

The 2001 Durban Declaration claimed Palestinians were "victims" of Israeli racism. Israel was the only one of 192 U.N. member states standing accused. Quite deliberately, therefore, Salehi will address one of the "roundtable" gatherings organized by the U.N., titled, "Victims of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance: recognition, justice and development."

The storyline is older than the modern state of Israel. Reporters portray American Jews as parochially fixated on Israel and ask: Will the issue help Republicans win support from the rare affluent group that votes Democratic? The answer is no. There's a round of these articles every presidential cycle, and the answer is the same every time. Obama will likely perform worse with Jews in 2012 than in 2008. But that's because he'll likely perform worse with nearly everyone.

Turkey’s Islamist regime subverted and then opposed sanctions against Iran. That regime also declared Iran and Syria, Hamas and Hizballah to be its friends. It also sponsored a terrorist group (the IHH) to provoke Israel into an international incident that would generate Islamist martyrs and dead Israeli soldiers. Now, rejecting Israeli conciliation attempts (regrets; donations to families of jihadists who got killed trying to kill Israelis), the Turkish regime escalated to the verge of war.

Now the Turkish prime minister goes to Egypt, proposes an alliance with the Egyptian revolution, then advocates a united bloc of Arabs, Iranians, and Turks as well as war on Israel to the assembled Arab foreign ministers.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton tells the Islamist Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, according to a U.S. diplomat,

Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL) introduces House resolution that supports annexation if the Palestinian Authority continues to push for UN vote.

U.S. Representative Joe Walsh (R-IL), introduced on Monday a resolution (with 30 co-sponsors) to support Israel’s right to annex the West Bank in the event that the Palestinian Authority continues to push for vote at the United Nations.

"Then was the palm of the hand sent from before Him, and this writing was inscribed: MENE MENE, TEKEL UPHARSIN. This is the interpretation of the thing....Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting."
--The Book of Daniel

By Barry Rubin

Agence France Press reports that the Palestinian bid for UN recognition of unilateral statehood is “causing diplomatic panic” in the United States and Israel.

While Israel is certainly concerned, I think “panic” is totally wrong as a description. After all, Israel’s overwhelming interpretation is that the UN event will change nothing. As for U.S. panic, where has the Obama Administration been for the last year when this outcome was totally predictable?

The Associated Press says that Israel is “increasingly isolated” ahead of the vote. I don’t think that’s how Israelis look at this either.

...Encounter Books has just released a new Broadside titled A Century of Palestinian Rejectionism and Jew Hatred by Sol Stern. The book reviews the long history of the disputed territory, from the Ottoman Empire to today. Bill Whittle of Declaration Entertainment produced a longish video to accompany the book’s release, using the whiteboard animation technique to walk through the various attempts to get the Palestinians to accept a partition and a sovereign state. It’s a must-watch primer on the various issues under debate this week, as well as an indictment of current American policy:

‘American Laws for American Courts’ Superior to Oklahoma’s Amendment Banning Shariah Law

Washington, DC, September 19th, 2011- On Election Day 2010, Oklahoma voters overwhelmingly approved State Question 755 (the “Save Our State Amendment”) that would prevent “foreign laws in general, and Islamic Sharia law in particular, from overriding state or U.S. laws.” While the concerns of the voters were well founded in regards to the increasing use of foreign legal rulings into state court decisions (see Shariahinamericancourts.com), the tool used to combat it was imprecise and vulnerable to Constitutional challenges.

The American Public Policy Alliance—promoters of “American Laws for American Courts” (ALAC) legislation passed in three states—responded to new challenges on Oklahoma’s State Question 755 by stressing the differences between the two approaches. ALAC is a facially neutral bill which seeks to ban foreign law from entering American courts when it infringes upon the Constitution.

An article from the Center for Security Policy’s Christopher Holton in the American Thinker describes these differences.

You can download the Topline from the survey here.
You can download the cross tabs here.

NEW YORK, NY – Iran is now seen as the top national security threat to the United States, according to the findings of a new bipartisan poll of 1,000 Americans released by the non-partisan grassroots public interest group Secure America Now, and 96 percent of Americans view national security as an important factor when deciding their vote for the next president. The national poll of 1,000 likely 2012 election voters was conducted in August by Democrat Pat Caddell and Republican John McLaughlin. It has a +/- accuracy level of 3.1 percent.

“I certainly have some concerns. The first step in any peaceful negotiation for a two-state solution for the Palestinians is to recognize the right of Israel’s existence. They have to denounce terrorism in both word and deed. And they have to sit down and negotiate with Israel directly. Anything short of that is a non-starter in my opinion.”

Perry’s statement had three parts: Palestinians must recognize Israel’s existence; they have to denounce terrorism; they have to negotiate with Israel directly. “Anything short of that is a non-starter in my opinion,” he declared. Perry is stuck in a time warp. He’s describing a situation that existed in the 1980s, not really today. (Some people might argue about some of that, but we will explain below.)

Sultan Knish writes about The End of Palestine--and the end of a terrorist group that has been postponed for far too long:

...From its founding, the PLO had always been a tool of larger movements in the Arab Muslim world. It began as a tool of Arab Socialism, and Pan-Arabism, the dream of a single Arab state encompassing the entire Arab world. An Arab socialist Caliphate. Even while agitating for the Palestinian cause, Shukairy went on promoting Pan-Arabism, in which there would be no independent Palestine. But then again an independent Palestine had never been the point.

By the 70's and 80's, the PLO had become a poisoned knife that cut the hands of its wielders. This is the common enough fate of those who create terrorist groups and imagine that they can control them. The PLO had managed to commit a number of terrorist atrocities in Israel, and Arafat, the 3rd successor to Shukairy, had become a household name. But it had achieved nothing except headlines.

In the seventies, the PLO attempted to seize control of part of Jordan, which after all had comprised the majority of the Palestine Mandate. But the PLO was brutally suppressed by the Jordanian regime of King Hussein, and was expelled from the country. It tried the same thing again in Beirut a few years later, trying to carve a "Second Palestine" out of Lebanon. It failed again, with horrifying results for the entire country.

By the late eighties, the PLO was done. Egypt had made a peace deal with Israel. Jordan had a tacit understanding with Israel under the table. Syria was the only Arab country bordering Israel that was still somewhat supportive of the PLO, but it had little use for the PLO as a terrorist organization inside Israel, because the PLO was Arab, and the Golan Heights which Syria hoped to conquer was Druze. Instead Syria was far more interested in using the PLO to spread chaos in Lebanon for its own purposes.

We can expect a lot of chest thumping from Obama over the coming months, both claiming that he is a great friend of Israel and that people are distorting his record. I imagine that Obama's defenders will denigrate Bush's record on Israel, saying that he was too friendly to Israel and alienated the Arab world.

There are arguments against that claim, but the fact remains that Bush visited Israel after he was elected to his second term, and listening to his speech to the Israeli Knesset, you get the sense of genuine feeling.

Meanwhile, we still wait for Obama to visit the country he calls "friend" and "ally"--perhaps to deliver a speech that equals his Cairo speech.

Obama has started his 2012 campaign and his Jewish support is weakening--so we may yet see Obama visit Israel.

Till then, here is the speech Bush gave.
A transcript of the speech follows after the video.